Some Asian countries are dropping punitive approaches in favor of a health-centered approach.

Executions, forced and arbitrary detentions, beatings, whipping, incarceration and hard labor — This is a common face of drug policy in many Asian nations, and one that is looking ever more archaic.

Half a million drug users are held annually in compulsory detention centers in China and Southeast Asia, according to estimates from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). Arduous physical exercises and military drills are often routine there, as is violence – former detainees described shocks with electric batons and whipping with electric wires to Human Rights Watch.

Roughly 50 to 70 percent of prisoners in Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, and Thailand are in jail for drug-related crimes. In extreme cases, prisoners pay with their lives. Indonesia is currently preparing executions for drug trafficking.

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Asia's war on drugs

Harm Reduction International has published a new tool for use by prison monitoring mechanisms (national, regional and international) to monitor the management of communicable diseases and harm reduction in prisons and prevent human rights violations in this context. Gen Sander, Human Rights Analyst at Harm Reduction International, introduces the tool here.

"Last October, I wrote a blog for PRI in which I discussed the necessity of tackling communicable diseases such as HIV, hepatitis C (HCV) and tuberculosis (TB) in prisons. I explained that prisoners are significantly more likely to be living with these diseases than the general population for several reasons, including the fact that people who use or inject drugs comprise a large portion of the world’s prison population as a result of punitive drug laws, combined with an absence of harm reduction services, such as needle and syringe programmes (NSP) and opioid substitution therapy (OST), which are proven to prevent HIV and HCV transmission and strongly recommended by WHO, UNAIDS and UNODC."

Thumbnail: Flickr Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

Scaling up harm reduction in prisons: a role for prison monitors and new tools

By Prashanth Parameswaran - The Diplomat

The third round of drug convict executions during Jokowi’s presidency is in the works.

Ten foreign drug convicts on death row will face firing squads this month as part of a third round of controversial executions under President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo, local authorities have said.

, Central Java Police spokesman Sr. Comr. A. Liliek Darmanto said that ten foreign citizens, along with five Indonesians, would face the firing squad at the Nusakambangan prison island off the southern coast of Central Java. The ten include four Chinese, one Pakistani, two Nigerians, two Senegalese, and one Zimbabwean.

The executions would the first since eight drug convicts – five of them foreign – were executed in April 2015, a move which roiled relations between Jakarta and other countries and led Australia to temporarily withdraw its ambassador. An earlier round of executions occurred in January last year.

Indonesia to execute 10 foreigners in war on drugs

SSDP UK have recently launched a drug testing initiative in Newcastle university.

It’s obvious that the safest way to use drugs is not to use them at all and whilst no substance is inherently safe, drug use surveys at universities around the country have consistently shown that over 50% of students claim to have tried drugs. After more than 40 years of the failed war on drugs, drug deaths are at their highest since records began in England and Wales. The reality is that expecting young people to ‘just say no’ is inadequate and to claim that it works, avoids the real issues at hand.

Picture from SSDP campaign "Test your drugs, don't test yourself".

Thumbnail: CC Students for Sensible Drug Policy UK

‘Just say no’ has failed our generation: What you need to know about our drug testing initiative

PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad (CMC) — The Trinidad and Tobago government is examining the possibility of decriminalising marijuana and is reviewing existing legislation as well as planning wide consultation before adopting any position, Attorney General Faris Al-Rawi has said.

He told the Trinidad Guardian newspaper yesterday that there has been “a full exercise of analysing the types of crime in our prisons and the pre-trials detention or remand statistics for a range of offences, including possession of narcotics, and particularly possession of cannabis.

“From that perspective there’s certainly a drive to gather statistical information, as the issue of decriminalising of marijuana isn’t a simple one on the public side,” he said.

Al-Rawi told the newspaper that “if one were to argue for decriminalisation, the limits to be applied must be considered”.

Click hehttp://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/T-T-mulling-decriminalising-ganjare to read the full article.

Trinidad and Tobago mulling decriminalising ganja

A few weeks ago we attended the United Nations General Assembly Special Session on the World Drug Problem (UNGASS) in New York. This was the first time in 18 years that such a high level meeting has taken place to debate drug policy. For many working on the issue it was a significant opportunity to challenge the prohibition paradigm, and sow the seeds of reform.

Yet for us and other civil society attending, the meeting was a constant battle against exclusion. Despite having followed every process necessary to ensure access, the rules of admission changed not only daily, but hourly in some cases. This led to surreal levels of bureaucratic and security restriction, which limited and denied access to meetings and debates which many had travelled far to attend. The closed process of negotiations prior to the meeting in New York excluded not only civil society, but also more than 100 UN member states, largely from the Global South.

Whilst disappointing overall, the final outcome document adopted by all member states at the meeting contains some promising points on development. These include strong commitments to ensure access to controlled drugs for medical use, by targeting barriers in national legislation and regulations, with the aim to improve capacity, education and training, and affordability, all of which currently limit access to essential medicines.

The need to mainstream a gender perspective across all drug control policies, and to address specific gendered needs and vulnerabilities associated with involvement in the drugs trade was also recognised. Commitments were also made to address the disproportionate numbers of women being imprisoned on drug related charges, and gendered barriers in access to health, care and social services.

Reflecting on UNGASS: Disappointment and hope for sustainable development

Over the past decade, alternative development has come a long way. The recently launched "Sustainable Development Goals" and the "United Nations Guiding Principles on Alternative Development", which Thailand is proud to have played an active role in helping to shape, serve as valuable references to guide our alternative development efforts.

However, our work is far from over. We need to ensure we move forward from words and recommendations to actual implementation with measurable and sustainable outcomes. So please allow me as a development practitioner to speak frankly based on more than 50 years of experience working on the ground with the people.

Light shines on development goals in Thailand

The new government has pledged to press ahead with plans for supervised drug injection centres. The Fine Gael-led minority administration will also support a health-led rather than criminal justice approach to drugs, it was confirmed today in the new Programme for Government.

There were concerns among campaigners that plans for the injection rooms, which were championed by former drugs minister Aodhán Ó Ríordáin, could be set aside by the new government.

after losing his seat in the general election, the former Labour TD said he had “no idea” what would happen to the plan he had set in train.

The new government has committed to bringing in drug injection rooms

The April 2016 UN General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) on the world drug problem offered a unique opportunity to re-examine the approach of punitive suppression that underpins global drug control. As the first such meeting to be held since 1998, it was a chance to set a new course, leaving behind what the UN Office on Drugs and Crime has called the negative ‘unintended consequences’ of the ‘war on drugs’.

Part of setting a new course must mean bringing human rights into the heart of drug control. For too long, States have approached international drug control law in isolation, as if these obligations exist separate and apart from the broader framework of international law, and may be interpreted and applied as if no overlapping treaty obligations come into play. This approach has contributed to the growth of human rights violations linked to drug control in all regions of the world – the death penalty; torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment; arbitrary detention; denial of due process rights; violations of the right to health; mass incarceration; and many more.

However, the obligations established in the drug conventions cannot be interpreted and implemented in isolation, and must take into account concomitant obligations in other legal regimes. This principle has driven efforts – sometimes successful, other times not – to forge a more humane and rights-based approach to drug control within the UN system.

The human rights ‘win’ at the UNGASS on drugs that no one is talking about, and how we can use it

With an increasing number of jurisdictions enacting or contemplating reforms creating legal access to cannabis for purposes other than exclusively "medical and scientific," tensions regarding the drug conventions and evolving law and practice in Member States continue to grow.

Thumbnail: Youtube WOLA: Washington Office on Latin America

Cannabis and the conventions: UNGASS and beyond

Following a UN conference on drugs last month, countries in the region are being accused of sticking with ineffective and harmful anti-drug policies

Last month in New York, governments and civil society attended the UN’s General Assembly Special Session (UNGASS) to discuss the global drug problem. There were high hopes, particularly as Latin American countries most affected by the so-called “War on Drugs” had strongly pushed for the session, that there could be a revolution in drug policy. What resulted was, at best, a small evolution in thinking.

It may lead to more flexibility from the UN on drug treaties, increased acceptance that harsh drug laws are not working and a change in the language used around drug users. But for Southeast Asian governments, and in particular Asean as a whole, it seems a revolution is still some way off.

“The UNGASS event itself clearly marked a shift in thinking and a widening gap between reform-minded countries and those that want to retain the status quo,” said Tom Blickman, programme coordinator for policy group Transnational Institute. “Unfortunately, most Southeast Asian countries and China belong to latter category and Asean is still committed to the unrealistic goal of a drug-free society.”

Region’s harsh drug policies slammed by experts

It takes a little getting used to: bringing an illicit substance to an official booth at a rave to have its contents analyzed before you ingest it. At first people tend to be skeptical. Is this some sort of trap? Will I be arrested and thrown into jail? This is Mexico, after all—a country firmly entrenched in the war on drugs.

Ending this war is the main objective of our youth drug policy organization ReverdeSer Colectivo [site in Spanish]. And a key part of that effort are the services we offer at raves and festivals, where you can find us handing out information about drugs, helping patrons having physical or psychedelic problems, and analyzing their pills before they take them to make sure they’re safe to ingest.

This is the essence of harm reduction—an approach that accepts drug use as a fact of life, and works to minimize the risks of such usage. In that spirit, ReverdeSer Colectivo is working with other organizations like Espolea and CUPIHD to implement a substance analysis project in Mexico City. We are engaging with the local addictions institute and human rights commission to establish a lab that could not only analyze substances but also serve as a key place for harm reduction programs for people who use drugs.

Our work doing substance analysis at festivals and raves gives us an opportunity to talk about safer ways to use drugs and to hand out information to people about the drugs they’ll be using.

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